Month: November 2009

One of the advantages of our grocery system in the U.S. is that we can have turkey or ham any time of the year, not just on holidays. My kids didn’t want either one this year, so we agreed on deer tenderloin steaks.

The menu also included chicken breasts for variety; baked sweet potatoes (no marshmallows); green beans; mixed green salad with homemade vinegar and oil dressing; and for dessert homemade pumpkin pie with Reddi-Whip whipped cream. I made whole-wheat bread in the bread machine, but it didn’t rise very well, and it was heavy, so at the last moment I put frozen biscuits in the oven, which we ate with real butter and honey. No dressing; no mashed potatoes and gravy; not much left over.

Sweet potatoes and pumpkin are high in vitamin A and fiber. Deer is very lean, low in cholesterol. Whipped cream is real, not fake. Vinegar and oil are real ingredients too. Of course, turkey and ham are real too, and very good for you, just not what our stomachs were hungry for.

Do you read ingredients labels on food items? Words we can’t pronounce. Preservatives to extend the shelf life into eternity. Supposedly even the ants and roaches won’t eat some of those things.

Psalms 103:1-2, 5 says, “Bless the Lord, O my soul; and all that is within me bless His holy name! Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits:. . .Who satisfies your mouth with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.”

God filled the earth with good things just for you and me. On the third day of creation, even before God made man, He planned what man would eat. Genesis 1:11-12 says, “Then God said, ‘Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed, and the fruit tree that yields fruit. . . and God saw that it was good.”

Then after the flood, God told Noah, “And every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs.” Genesis 9:3.

Oatmeal for breakfast with honey and pecans—the perfect fall breakfast.

When I was a kid, I hated oatmeal. Gummy, gooey, stick-in-your-throat mess. I forced mine down with toast. We ate cornmeal mush, sometimes fried in bacon grease, or boiled rice, with butter, sugar, and milk, but that stuck in my throat too.

Sometimes we had eggs but Mama always made “lace” on my eggs, burned places on the edges where it was cooked at too high a temperature, or the yolk would be broken or hard. And when she scrambled eggs, she stirred them in the pan, instead of beating them in a bowl first, and there were always strings of egg white, which made me gag.

When I was about ten, she gave me my own little cast iron fry pan which I still have and basically said, “Fix your own eggs.”

Mama was a great cook who worked at the school cafeteria for 25 years. All the kids remember her brown beans and cornbread, turkey and dressing, hot rolls, but she was best known for her cinnamon rolls and peanut butter cookies.

Now I am trying to go back to God’s natural eating plan. I am still picky, but not as spoiled by my mama as I was when I was a child. I try to limit processed foods and use olive oil and natural oils for cooking. And I keep fruit and nuts and dark chocolate around for snacking.

I sauté fish and I use my electric grill for chicken breasts, instead of frying. We eat dark green salads with home-mixed olive oil and balsamic vinegar dressing. We eat whole-grain cereals and use whole wheat-bread.

Genesis 1: 29 “And God said, “See, I have given you every herb that yields seed ….and every tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food.” Then after the flood, God told Noah, in Genesis 9:3, ““Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs.”

Say the word, “love” and what image forms in your mind? Young couples walking arm in arm on a secluded beach? A mother holding her newborn baby? An older couple celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary?

Jesus modeled true love when He walked on this earth. He called the little children to Himself, sat them on His lap, and cuddled them. He stopped a funeral procession, raised the dead boy and presented him back to his mother. He raised Peter’s mother from the sickbed. He cried as He gave Lazarus back alive to his two sisters. His last act from the cross was providing a home with John for His widowed mother.

Jesus was love personified, but He was not afraid to condemn the Pharisees for their hypocritical lifestyle, while bragging on the little widow who gave her last few pennies to God. He could be sarcastic, like when Judas betrayed him with a kiss. He rebuked Peter and the disciples frequently for their lack of faith. He drove the money-changers from the temple with a whip He made Himself, when He saw that His Father’s house of prayer had become a shopping mall, where people were ripped off and short-changed.

Jesus was not a lily-livered coward, who turned the other cheek and let the Romans and Jews kill Him, as He has frequently been portrayed in films. He was a real man who stood strong in the face of His enemies and deliberately let them take Him to the cross. Jesus gave Himself to die—they did not kill Him.

That was His destiny, His goal, the reason He came to earth—to die.

John 15:13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

Have you ever watched concrete being poured? They build a wooden frame around the area they are going to pour into, building it up to the depth they want and the shape they intend for it to become. Then they pour the cement and smooth off the top, working the bubbles out, and let it set up.

The frame forms the boundary of the concrete, causing it to take shape. We are living life today exactly as we have framed it with our words.

In Heb 11:3, the Bible says, “By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God.” This is how God made the world, framing it with his Word.

Don’t blame your parents or society or religion. Of course, bad things happen, even to good people, but the outcome of your life depends on what you say. Your eternal salvation depends on believing in your heart that Jesus is the Son of God and confessing with your mouth that He is your Lord. Romans 10:9.

If you have wayward children or a spouse that isn’t serving God, for instance, here is a good scripture to frame with. “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” Josh 24:15. Another good verse is Acts 16:31 which says, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved, you and your household.”

If your body is sick and you need healing, frame your healing with these words: Matt 8:17 “He Himself took our infirmities, and bore our sicknesses.” Here is another good one. I Pet 2:24 “By whose stripes you were healed.”

Maybe you don’t like what your world has become. Maybe you are ready for a change. How can you change it? Reframe it. Start building your frame. Speak the Word of God.

I am today what I have made myself to become by the words of my mouth. We can frame our world just like God does, with our words.

When I was a telephone operator, we had a work technique called over-lapping.

The operator answered a call, took the information required, and placed a long-distance call. Then as that phone call was ringing, the operator clicked off that call, and answered another call. When the called party on the first call answered, a red light turned green, and if no further action was required, the operator started the timing on the call for the purpose of charging the calling party.

While the operator was starting the timing on the first call, she would also be taking the details and placing that second call. A good operator could have 3 or 4 calls going at one time.

I still do that. While I am downloading a computer program, I might have another computer running an anti-spyware program, and a third doing Windows Update. I go from one to another to check the progress, at the same time writing a weekly devotional, or going through photos.

This is over-lapping or multi-tasking. My brain is wired this way, but not everyone can do this. I have worked with some people who had a one-track mind. If they start trouble-shooting and were interrupted, they had to start over at the beginning again, but my mind is able to pick up where I left off and continue as though I weren’t interrupted.

My ability to over-lap or multitask is a strength, but also a weakness. In its very worst state, multitasking causes a person to be flighty, going from one task to another and never accomplishing anything concrete.

Paul said in II Corinthians 12:9 that the Lord told him, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Then Paul said, “Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.”

By presenting our weaknesses to the Lord, we can join our weakness with the Lord’s strength and receive His grace.

Then we will see that the very thing we struggle most to overcome will become our greatest strength.